Hermitage

 Even at the ripe old age of 41 I still feel an incredible amount of shyness. My wife is the only person I've ever met that I feel safe talking to, anybody else I would rather just avoid having any contact. When I have to I talk to people but that is always just to achieve something, some forced interaction such as buying something in a shop. However beyond that I will not say a thing to anybody if they don't interact with me first.

  I always wondered why I find it so crippling to go up to someone and say something. Let alone confrontation, I'll always try to find a non confrontational way to resolve a problem. I know this annoys some people but it is just the way I do things. To be honest I've gotten over worrying about what other people think of me, I just try to be who I am. There was a time when I did, long ago. However meeting my wife and loving being with her got rid of all of that.

  If I could just be with my wife and do things with her for the rest of my life I would. I get so fed up with interacting with other people. I need a better way of controlling who can interact with me other than they happen to be near my physically or putting something online where there is something else I'm trying to read. The world needs a people filter so you can filter out anybody you don't want to hear from. Wouldn't that be too cool?

  I don't know, maybe I just don't need other people. I don't need all that stuff that goes along with it, I'd rather do something quiet indoors that all that messing about with other people around. When my wife and I go out we always get to somewhere as it opens before the crowds get there and by the time we leave wherever it is is starting to fill up. Then again I am a person who could sit playing a videogame all day and not come up for air let alone remember to eat 3 meals in a day, a habit that I know annoys my wife. I've no idea why I like just getting so absorbed in to something like that but I do.

  I think a better way to describe all this would be to say that I want control over when and how much I interact with people. I want to chose when it happens rather than have someone force it on me. If that makes me slightly introverted or whatever then so be it. I like who I am mostly and I'm not going to change it.

I'm (almost) in the money

  As part of the company merger a bunch of stock option and restricted stock stuff happened. I just got the notice that the conversion has happened and set up the new part of my brokerage account. Seeing large numbers again is a nice thing to have. For so long there have been number there but they've never been very large and incredibly rarely been worth anything. The potential for large amounts of money here though is very good. Not to mention next month there is more coming as my "new hire" stock options get allocated. It's another day of sort of exciting stuff since there is so much possible upside. If this can keep going and actually do something, unlike the literally thousands of stock options I've lost due to them not being worth anything, then life will get better. Not to mention retirement savings etc.

  It's also weird that quite a lot of my future is still reliant on so many other people doing their jobs well. I know the people around me that I work with can do their jobs well (the ones that couldn't are no longer here) but there are a lot more people now. If they mostly can keep things going then hurrah.

  So, now that some things are actually going our way can the rest of them line up properly and do so. New house, more money, more cats, the list could go on for quite a while :| .

So many opportunities

  Just had the first engineering meeting since the company merger. We went over all the products and what is being developed on each and how the department is going to be organised. It is a lot of information and there are so many things I could do now rather than the limited range I had previously simply due to the amount of work compared to the few people here. When you look at the numbers engineering is about 45% of the people in the company. That is a lot of developers and testers. Reminds me of the old days here when we were a company with over a 1000 people.

  Still I need to make sure I don't get lost in the forest and make my mark. I know the people I've worked with know my mark but I need to spread that out to the new people I'm bound to interact with and work on things with. This is especially true when I get a way to move either across the country or to somewhere better to live.

  Also looking at what I could do I feel so much less limited in where I can go than I did. Nothing has changed yet obviously, it's literally only been 3 days, but I can feel that excited nervousness that I've not had for quite a while. The last time was when I got myself off of the old products here on to the new products that were worth working on. If I can do that again I can make things happen.

A list

1. Birthday Cake
2. Rice Krispie treats
3. Black Forest Gateau
4. Cinnamon buns

  Just a few of the delicious things my wife has made for us recently. She has gotten in to making seriously good food after not being able to cook due to her surgery for a while. My stomach is very grateful for it. The house has had all sorts of good smells going on in it from baking to dinner to snacks. Ah the life of a husband to an amazing cook.

Been a while

  Just finished the HR and IT meeting for the new company I now work for after the merger. It has been a while since I've had to deal with all this stuff. There is so much paperwork (well online form filling out) that it is annoying. Especially since all it really is going to be is the same information my old company had transferred to the new company. Still there is an improvement in my overall benefits with this company like more time off, better compensation (via salary, stock, ESPP, etc.) and other minor stuff that it will be worth it in the end.

  It just seems strange to be doing this all over again. Being a "new hire" and yet doing a job for a company where I've been employed for over 18 years. Kind of a oxymoron in a way.

  I just want a chance to actually progress in life now though. After spending so much time making sure that my paycheck would continue to arrive and having other parts of the company not keep up their end of the bargain so that the company struggled has been incredibly frustrating. I've worked so hard over the years I just want to get some of what I should have reaped in the end. Maybe it will finally arrive now and I can treat my wife the way she should be treated. That is what it is all about really. Working to provide for my wife so that she doesn't have to deal with the stresses and troubles of life.

Get going

  I'm a bit of a procrastinator occasionally. Take this blog post for instance, it has taken me 10 minutes from starting to write something to writing these first words. My wife however can go from idea to implementing a plan in less than a minute. Me, I need to think it through for much longer. My wife's way of doing things has been a good influence on me since without her I doubt I would ever have gotten half the things I've done actually accomplished. Not always successfully mind you but that is more a fault of my ability and/or method of implementation than the intent of the action.

  Still I do wonder what I wouldn't have done with my life without her. How much less of a person I would be if she wasn't part of my life, well almost my whole life to be honest. I usually do the same thing over and over once I find something I enjoy. I immerse myself in it to the detriment of most other things for a while. Take my mention the other day of eating the same over and over for breakfast. I would carry on doing that forever. My wife however has made me lots and lots of breakfast burritos with stuff in them I like. Without her I would never have that.

  In that and a million other ways my wife makes my life better and I love her for it. Now I just need to get going on making her life better in every way I can.

The vote is in

  Well the official shareholder vote for the merger of my company happened yesterday. According to the results this morning it was 20,798,537 for, 427,989 against and 20,229 abstained. That is a pretty overwhelming yes vote I think. If all goes to plan I will go home as an employee of another company today for the first time in over 18 years. Almost 19 if you count the time I was a temp at this company before I started working here. Already the sign out by the road on the business estate we are in has been painted over. If I am correct we will have a new sign on the front of the building by Monday. No hanging around here with this new company and getting stuff done. The only fun bit is I will be working from home Monday on my first official day as an employee of the new company.

  Roll on the next part of my career and the possibilities that come along with it. If I can get my wife and I somewhere nearer where we want to be then this has been a good thing.

I'm not an idiot

  Talked to the place servicing the car earlier today. They are fixing a couple of minor things and making sure the car is running well. However the iPod hookup that stopped working last week apparently needs a part replacing. The cost for this? Over $600. To fix something that barely cost $300 to install in the first place with a part that costs $130 to get. What the hell people. Do you really think I'm that stupid?

  Luckily I'm slightly aware of what it takes to work on a car and the associated parts. I'm not physically skilled enough to do it so I'm fine with paying someone else to do it since it's a much better use of my time. However there has to be a limit. It's like the $200 cables you see at Best Buy. They only cost $5 in parts and labour to make but because that is the price asked for stupid people pay it.

  It just annoys me that people try to take advantage almost of other people's ignorance. At least offer an honest price for something, you'll get much more customer satisfaction and repeat business in the long run over a short term monetary gain. Just an example of what can be completely wrong with business practices and parts of the economy.

Always remember

  I played a little bit more of Lego Batman 2 last night and I've reached the point where Lego Superman is part of your group. You can take control of him and fly around Gotham City. Doing so and the original Superman theme from the first film starts up and immediately you recognise it. It literally took a few notes and I could remember back to so long ago (yikes, 1978? really?) seeing that original film. Weird how your brain works like that hearing just a little bit of sound and all sorts of memories come back to you. How the hell does your brain file away all those things and let them be retrieved by a simple small piece of external input whether it be sound, sight, smell etc.

  Anyway since flying around as Lego Superman is so cool take a look at this quick video which also has a bonus part of Lego Superman riding around on a Lego gorilla.

Skills I don't have

  There are several things I'm not very good at. Expressing myself clearly. Writing. Cooking. Since my wife's surgery she hasn't done much of the cooking since she was not physically capable. The last few days though she has done some proper cooking compared to my throwing prepackaged or take out stuff on a plate method. I've missed eating food this nice. We've had stir fry, roast dinner, french toast breakfast, all good stuff.

  The act of putting edible things together in a way that tastes good is something that my brain doesn't comprehend. I know of things I like to eat but coming up with a way for stuff to be assembled and the act of doing that I usually totally fail at. If I didn't have my wife to feed me I very probably would eat just a few of the same simple things over and over every day. It is amazing how often I eat the same bowl of cereal at work every day and never get tired of it. I can eat the same thing for months and years on end. It never occurs to me to try something different or mix things up somehow. I really am a creature of habit that way.

  So a big huzzah to my wife for bringing all sorts of delicious food variations in to my life, without her my eating habits would be so much more boring.

Who was that?

  My wife and I started watching the entire DVD collection of Enterprise the other day. It is one of the few Star Trek series that I enjoy after TNG. It has been amusing seeing faces we recognise from shows that came later. Seeing the slightly wooden acting of people getting one of their first jobs. The amount of times someone famous has a single episode part before they are very famous can make for some funny moments, especially from something genre specific as Star Trek and all the make up and costumers it involves. It does make for moments where you go who was that or was that who I think is was?

    In other news the buyout of my company is progressing, in theory I will be working for another company by next week if everything goes to plan. Exciting times prospects wise, more news forthcoming as it happens and I can make it public.

  We spent another day at the Zoo sunday given that our membership runs out next month. It was a good day animal activity wise. Most of them were actually doing stuff and not just lazing around like they do. The best one was the huge hippo they have playing around in his pool. We got quite a few good shots and some decent video. Below is one of the good ones of him playing with the water shooting in to the pool. He really got close to that and sprayed water everywhere as he let it go in his mouth and over his head, he really seemed to be enjoying it.

    Anyway, going to do some work now and think positive happy thoughts. My wife and I need to move on from our house soon and the good possibility of that happening soon is making life a little easier right now.

Belly buttons

  My wife has a new belly button again. I think this is the first time her belly button has not been a very going inny type. There is visible skin in the little dent and not much knot visible. With all the surgeries she has had it has taken a fair bit of reconstruction over the last couple of years. The current one looks great. All that for a vestige of where we are joined at birth and while we form as a physical person. Lots of little bits on the body are strange like that. Either have no more purpose as in the belly button or no actual purpose ever like nipples on a man. Biology was probably my weakest science subject at school because a lot of it makes no sense. There is no logical order to it all. It ends up looking great though (except for maybe slugs, ewww).

My mind is blank

  I think my brain wants to stop for a bit. I keep trying to think about things and just nothing happens. I try to concentrate on some work and my mind wanders around thinking about nothing much at all. I get easily distracted from what I'm supposed to do. My brain really is trying to get me to be unproductive at the moment. If I could find a way to do no work at all I would do it so that I don't have to think at all. Not to mention I could quite easily take a long nap at the moment.

  Yeah it's one of those kind of days. I have zero enthusiasm to do anything. Bah.

Miss my iPod

  The ipod connection to the radio in the car stopped working the other day. No idea why but it just doesn't recognise that there is an iPod attached. I've got an appointment to get it looked at and fixed (once they get a part in that I need replaced on the car at the same time) but with my drive to and from work I'm really missing it. Going back to how it used to be is a real bummer. Getting that iPod connection in the car for my birthday way back not long after we got the car was something really worth doing. Once you get used to being able to listen to anything you want when you want it is very frustrating not having that ability any more. Not to mention all the podcast listening I'm missing out on which I enjoy a lot.

  I think what I'm trying to say is that once you have a choice of doing what you want when you want going to something where that is not possible is annoying. TV is in a similar situation, networks want you to watch their programs when they come on. However so many people are used to being able to watch TV on their own schedule that any effort to enforce that again seems to archaic. Some networks like HBO are really trying to force this, they have more people watching torrented versions of Game Of Thrones than actual subscribers. Surely that tells you there is something wrong with your business model. Take the upcoming release of the 3D version of Avatar (not that I'm interested) because of silly business deals it has been two and a half years since the film came out that you can actually buy it. WTF people.

  The sooner we can get to a system where we can just get access to media we want to and not be forced to have all sorts of other crap along with it the better. I suspect I would spend more on things if I could but there is simply no option right now.

More Lego stuff

  Been on a bit of a Lego thing again just recently. A new model for me to build turned up, I've been playing the Lego Batman 2 game, a trailer for Lego Lord of The Rings was released and they just turned 80 and released some stuff for that. Heck with the order of my new model they were meant to send a small birthday cake kit with it but it didn't turn up. Therefore I emailed them and they got back to me, apologised and promised to send one along shortly. Not to mention the time a piece was missing (well the wrong colour to be accurate) in another kit and they shipped out just that piece to me with no fuss.

  Also because I think it is cool here is the new trailer.



  Then we have the video that tells the rough story of Lego.

Bloody hot

  As with most of the northern hemisphere the last few days have been really hot. Talk about a good time to go away in the caravan and be enclosed in a small wooden box :) . Luckily our small wooden box has air conditioning so we didn't completely melt while away this weekend. We did trip the circuit breaker a couple of times but other than the first night, where we couldn't cool down the caravan enough, it was actually not too bad. Heck at one point my wife said she was getting cold the AC was working so well.

  As for the actual birthday I had fun. I went zip lining in the morning, getting there before virtually everybody else. By the time I was done with my two zips there was at least a half an hour wait to do it. I did a standard one which I had done before then a super one where you are basically lying flat facing the ground. Kind of a rush flying along looking down at the bushes and trees zipping past you. I hit a fair old speed as the people at the bottom who are there to catch you commented something along the lines of "bloody hell you got a good speed going there". It seems I have a natural talent for being able to zoom along quickly or at least aerodynamically when sliding down things. My poor old wife got to sit in the heat while doing this but she did catch a bit of video of me zooming down. By the time I was done the temperature had shot up so we got in the car with its lovely AC and got the hell out of there.

  The rest of the morning was then spent exploring the local hills/mountains. We went way up in to them and found a few good quiet places to stop and look out. We even found a nice quiet spot with nobody else around a reasonable distance from the road to have lunch with just the two of us. Well and a wasp that joined us for a bit and freaked my wife out somewhat. Still being somewhere that out of the way in the peace and quiet was very relaxing.

  The afternoon was spent back in the caravan watching films and then we went out to dinner to the one good restaurant in the town we were near. The food was good there but the place needed better AC, it got way too hot in there. That and people really don't dress up at all when going out to dinner, they stay stupidly scruffy. All in all though by the time 9PM came around we were both tired so had an early night. Birthdays like that are great, just being with the person you want to and doing stuff you like.

  In other important news I actually played a couple of games on my PS3 last night. With looking after my wife after her surgery I really haven't done much, we've spent more time in the bedroom watching the entirety of Northern Exposure so it was cool to get some game playing in again. I started Lego Batman 2 which is cool considering they have added voices. It helps you get all the little silly stuff they do in the cut scenes in those games even more and the humour is always great. I also quickly tried out Saints Row the Third, a game my wife doesn't like but my parents got me after it was left on the amazon wish list. That starts out crazy enough so there should be some stupid fun in there although I'll not be playing that in front of my wife.

  Now with that dump of text I better get back to work. Something of a crisis bug going on at the moment and I need to save the day again and get it fixed. Until next time.

Appetite for nothing

  Strangely this week I've not really had much of an appetite. I really don't have a hankering for any particular food and when I do eat I really don't eat much. I know I'm eating less as I get older but this week it seems to be really pronounced. The other night I didn't eat dinner until an hour after my wife and even then it was a sandwich, a few crisps and a drink, hardly stomach stuffing.

  These things come and go I suppose. Maybe in a couple of weeks I'll be scarfing down mountains of food and still feeling hungry. Right now though I eat enough to fuel myself and that's about it. Wonder how much I'll eat on my birthday in a few days?

  In more important news it is my birthday in a few days. Another one coming around and another slightly sinking feeling that maybe half my life has already gone by. I've done a lot with my life so far and spent a large amount of it with my wife. I still want more though so I suppose that says I'm still enjoying life. If you don't want to do anything, even to amuse yourself when you pass the time, then why bother? I could spend my time doing all sorts of things, I just don't have the time for all of it. Kind of frustrating.

Getting confused

  Somehow I keep getting confused as to what day it is this week. Yesterday, which was actually Tuesday, I thought it was Wednesday. Today I think its Thursday. Monday I thought it was Friday. Where the hell is my concept of time? I can tell roughly what time of day it is but the actual date is getting all over the place for me. Maybe it is a side effect of getting old, you really don't care about the day of week or time of year that much compared to being younger. Then again maybe my mind is going and I'll end up a vegetable next week :| .

Still British

  With the Olympics going on at the moment I've been keeping an eye on how it is going, who is winning what etc. Most of my interest though is coming from how the UK competitors are doing. Even though I'm a dual citizen I still see myself as more British than American it seems. The UK is doing really rather well considering that only the US and China are ahead due to purely either more people or more money or both. It is nice to see so many different medals being won especially since it is being held there. I know I've pledged allegiance to the US and I'll help out how I can I still feel more British. 15 years here hasn't changed me much compared to the 26 years I was in the UK. Clearly something was ingrained to me. I suppose though with the way I really don't want to associated with the vast majority of people it doesn't matter how I feel. I want to be antisocial overall, I like being with just a few people and more than anyone my wife.

Mixed bag of stuff

  Been a mixture of stuff happening lately. Bad drive to work this morning after getting stuck behind a car that got squished between two lorries. Not something that you come out unscathed from in any way. Doesn't seem to have been fatal checking the traffic incident page (no call for the coroner) but after seeing 5 fire engines, 1 ambulance and 4 CHP cars go by you know it is bad. That and 3 lanes of traffic ground to a halt in about 10 seconds. You don't see these kind of accidents very often but when you do you realise that being safe and calm on the road is the best bet.

  More news is coming through about the company buying the company I work for. Looks like benefits will get better mostly. A couple of weird things with them but good news overall, just need to make sure that all of our current doctors accept the new health insurance and/or we can get new ones easily if we move. A lot of organising to do there.

  In name of blog news (well partial name of blog) another birthday is coming up. Not a big a deal about this one since it is not the turning over of a decade but reason to celebrate none the less . No huge piles of loot this time either but just stuff I like and time with my wife, not much more I could ask for.

  Speaking of my wife she is healing nicely, one little scabby bit on the scar but the rest of it looks great. Now we just need the pain to go away and for her to get full mobility back. We did manage to get around the zoo ok this weekend so she is not completely crippled like she was immediately following the surgery. Hopefully I've managed my nurse abilities well enough that she has been able to totally rest.

Strange dreams

  I really don't remember any of my dreams, even right after waking up I barely remember if I actually had a dream. I've had a couple recently though that I can remember snippets of. One of them involved an elevated train, a normal sized one, and I was perched on the front of it and putting my feet down as it went down slopes and around corners to help slow it down. You know, put your foot down on the rail and push back, against a full sized train. Even stranger is that it was working and having an effect.

  Then last night I had some form of dream but I can't picture any of it at all. I remember it being clear as day as I was having but the exact details completely escape me. What a strange thing to happen, to know something went on in your mind but to have no idea what it was. I've been wracking my brains trying to think of it but it won't come to me. I suppose it may just randomly pop in to my head at some point but I know if I try to force the memory it will go further away.

  Still I can remember all the important things. I've never forgotten an important date with my wife (birthday, anniversary). I can remember the vast majority of things about her. I can also remember the vast majority of things about the games I play but they rank lower than my wife :| .

  So here's to nice strange dreams, not the ones that show things you are afraid of. No idea why you get one over the other but I can only hope those of you reading this get the same good weird ones I do. They can be quite fun from what I can recall.

A quick question

  A quick question to all you people out there that read this (not that I've looked at the stats for a while, I really doubt there are any of you). How awesome is your wife? Do they send pictures of women you fancy to you and have no problem with it? Mine does so therefore I have to classify my wife as completely awesome and definitely the pure definition of awesome (at least in my dictionary).

  Now back to work for me, kind of busy here right now unfortunately.